Global No.1 Nuclear Equipment Supplier Areva faces Russian Rosatom Intrusion in its Shrinking European Home Turf

The Nuclear Equipment Industry is seeing intensifying competition with the entry of the Chinese and the South Koreans.While Nuclear Energy Market in the Developed World has hit a Virtual Wall,the Emerging Markets are still growing strongly.China and India are the biggest growth markets with other smaller nascent markets like Vietnam,UAE,East Europe and others.The fight between the Great Powers like Russia,USA,Japan has instensified for a piece of this lucrative market.Russia state owned Rosatom is leaving no stone unturned to garner a bigger marketshare of the Nuclear Equipment Market.It is using its vertically integrated model right from supplying uranium raw material to waste disposal to penetrate European Markets.

Areva Dominant in Europe Faces Rosatom Intrusion in a Shrinking Market

Rosatom has strong competencies despite the Chernobyl disaster as a black mark in its history.The Company has already constructed reactors in China,India and Iran during the Soviet Union Days and is constructing 5 reactors in foreign markets.With strong technology expertise and with laxer safety standards at home,it is trying to outflank Areva in its home turf.Note Areva is already facing losses from the Finland Nuclear Project which has proved to be a huge disaster.It additionally faces competition from Toshiba-Westinghouse which is ramping up its efforts to compete with Areva.GE-Hitachi suffers from a technological handicap compared with Toshiba and Areva,however GE cannot be underestimated because of its Global Reach and Industrial Strengths.Rosatom is that last thing that Areva needs in its shrinking home turf of Europe.Germany is facing huge opposition just for extending the life of its nuclear reactors while France has pretty much saturated its Electricity Market with Nuclear Energy.

Russia Is Seeking to Build Europe’s Nuclear Plants – NY Times

Shrugging off the legacy of Chernobyl, the Russian state nuclear company, Rosatom, is preparing a bid on its second new project in the European Union, at the Temelin station in the Czech Republic, potentially worth $8 billion. Rosatom is already building a smaller unit in Bulgaria.As a legacy of the cold war, Russia possesses about 40 percent of the world’s uranium enrichment capacity, much more than it needs to service its domestic reactors. Enrichment refers to raising the level of the isotope 235 from about 0.7 percent in natural uranium to 3 percent to 5 percent for civilian reactor fuel.

Of the 60 reactors under construction worldwide, Rosatom is building 15 — 10 in Russia and 5 abroad — according to the Nuclear Energy Institute, a trade group in Washington.Rosatom, meanwhile, is striving to take advantage of its monopoly hold on the industry at home to aid in exports.It is a vertically integrated company, with divisions mining uranium, enriching fuel, building reactors and even decommissioning old plants.